Axe Head and Shaft Hole with Feline Decoration

Identification and Creation

Object Number: 1943.1318
Title: Axe Head and Shaft Hole with Feline Decoration
Other Titles: Alternate Title: Axe: Recumbent Lion above Feline Mask
Classification: Weapons and Ammunition
Work Type: axe
Date: 9th-first half 8th century BCE
Places: Creation Place: Ancient & Byzantine World, Asia, Luristan (Iran)
Period: Iron Age
Culture: Iranian
Persistent Link: https://hvrd.art/o/304066

Location

Location: Level 3, Room 3440, Ancient Mediterranean and Middle Eastern Art, Ancient Middle Eastern Art in the Service of Kings

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Physical Descriptions

Medium

Bronze handle holding iron blade

Technique

Cast, lost-wax process

Dimensions

10.5 x 15.5 x 2.6 cm (4 1/8 x 6 1/8 x 1 in.)
Of bronze: 8.7 x 5 cm (3 7/16 x 1 15/16 in.)

Technical Details

Chemical Composition: XRF data from Tracer
Alloy: Bronze
Alloying Elements: copper, tin
Other Elements: lead, iron, arsenic

K. Eremin, January 2014

Chemical Composition: ICP-MS/AAA data from sample, Bronze:
Cu, 88.58; Sn, 10.92; Pb, 0.15; Zn, less than 0.002; Fe, 0.08; Ni, 0.08; Ag, 0.03; Sb, less than 0.05; As, 0.14; Bi, less than 0.025; Co, 0.019; Au, less than 0.01; Cd, less than 0.001

J. Riederer

Technical Observations: The patina of the bronze component is green with areas of red and dark brown. Light brown accretions are also present. The iron blade is largely mineralized, and much of it is lost. The bronze surface is well preserved and has been carefully cleaned of corrosion products in most areas to reveal surface details. On one side, the mask and the band below the mask have not been cleaned and show the condition of the surface prior to treatment.

The bronze component is a solid cast, excluding the open hole for the shaft. The somewhat irregular shapes of the elements point to direct work in the wax model, but there is no proof that an indirect technique using molds was not used. All of the finer details were cold worked into the metal using circular and elongated punches and a tracer tool to form longer linear incisions. The bands below the masks on both sides were probably press-fitted around the iron blade to hold it in place.

Henry Lie (submitted 2012)

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History: M. K. Meskin, Paris, (by 1931). Mrs. Christian R. Holmes (before 1943). Grenville L. Winthrop, New York, NY, (by 1943), bequest; to Fogg Art Museum, 1943.

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line

Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Bequest of Grenville L. Winthrop

Accession Year

1943

Object Number

1943.1318

Division

Asian and Mediterranean Art

Contact

am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu

Permissions

THIS WORK MAY NOT BE LENT BY THE TERMS OF ITS ACQUISITION TO THE HARVARD ART MUSEUMS.

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Descriptions

Published Catalogue Text: Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Bronzes at the Harvard Art Museums
This axe-head consists of an ornate cast bronze shaft-hole and a corroded crescent-shaped iron blade. A relatively naturalistic lioness modeled in the round adorns the back of the shaft. Portrayed couchant, her head is held erect, and her tail rests upon her spine. Linear patterns embellish her haunches. An oval gap separates her incised belly from the cylindrical shaft-hole, the top, bottom, and middle of which are decorated with chevron-patterned cords in relief.

A frontal feline face in relief, typically referred to as a lion mask, connects the shaft component to the blade. Large eyes dominate the feline’s stylized features, which are enhanced with incised lines and are similar in formal composition to those of the round lioness. A spray of feathers, perhaps the remains of a bird, extends from the mouth and overlays the iron blade.

Represented in a number of collections and sometimes referred to as halberds, various axes of this type are attributed to Luristan, but the authenticity of many has been questioned (1). Tepe Sialk B has produced an excavated example (2).

NOTES:

1. See Antiquities from the Bomford Collection, exh. cat., The Ashmolean Museum, Oxford University (Oxford, 1966) no. 6.; P. Calmeyer, Datierbare Bronzen aus Luristan und Kirmanshah, Untersuchungen zur Assyriologie und Vorderasiatischen Archäologie 5 (Berlin, 1969) 70-73; E. de Waele, Bronzes du Luristan et d’Amlash, Publications d’historie de l’art et d’archeologie de l’Université Catholique de Louvain 34 (Louvain-La-Neuve, 1982) 30-33 and 38, figs. 17-20 and 28; A. Godard, Les Bronzes du Luristan, Ars Asiatica 17 (Paris, 1931) 57, nos. 62, 65, and 67-68, pls. 21-23; P. R. S. Moorey, Catalogue of the Ancient Persian Bronzes in the Ashmolean Museum (Oxford, 1971) 55 and 58-59, no. 27, pl. 3, fig. 7; P. R. S. Moorey et al., Ancient Bronzes, Ceramics, and Seals: The Nasli M. Heeramaneck Collection of Ancient Near Eastern, Central Asiatic, and European Art (Los Angeles, 1981) 27, nos. 47-53; W. Nagel, Altorientalisches Kunsthandwerk (Berlin, 1963) 18, nos. 40.a-b, pl. 23; C. Schaeffer, Stratigraphie comparée et chronologie de l'Asie occidentale, IIIe et IIe millénaires (London, 1948) nos. 7 and 10, pl. 265; J. A. H. Potratz, Luristanbronzen: Die einstmalige Sammlung Professor Sarre Berlin (Istanbul, 1968) 9, nos. 34-38, pls. 7-8; J. Rickenbach, Magier mit Feuer und Erz: Bronzekunst der frühen Bergvölker in Luristan, Iran (Zurich, 1992) 46-47; and Bronzes du Luristan: Énigmes d l’Iran ancien, III-Ier millénaire av. J.-C., exh. cat. Musée Cernuschi (Paris, 2008) 91, no. 34.

2. See R. Ghirshman, Fouilles de Sialk près de Kashan 1933, 1934, 1937 (Paris, 1939) 2: no. 12, pl. 26.

Amy Gansell

Publication History

Catalogue of the International Exhibition of Persian Art, Royal Academy of Arts, London, Royal Academy of Arts (London, 1931), p. 16, no. SS.
Arthur Upham Pope and Phyllis Ackerman, A Survey of Persian Art From Prehistoric Times to the Present, Oxford University Press (NY) and Oxford University Press (UK) (London, England and New York, NY, 1967), Vol. I, p. 267; Vol. VII, pl. 50a.
Dorothy W. Gillerman, ed., Grenville L. Winthrop: Retrospective for a Collector, exh. cat., Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, 1969), p. 256 (checklist).
Jane Waldbaum and Cyril Stanley Smith, "A Bronze and Iron Iranian Axe in the Fogg Art Museum", Studies Presented to George M. A. Hanfmann, ed. David Gordon Mitten, John Griffiths Pedley, and Jane Ayer Scott, Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1971), 195-209, pl. 56.a-c.
Susanne Ebbinghaus, "Men of Bronze--Cups of Bronze: Bronze in the Iron Age", Ancient Bronzes through a Modern Lens: Introductory Essays on the Study of Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Bronzes, ed. Susanne Ebbinghaus, Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 2014), 146-69, pp. 147-48, fig. 7.1.
Susanne Ebbinghaus, ed., Ancient Bronzes through a Modern Lens: Introductory Essays on the Study of Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Bronzes, Harvard Art Museum and Yale University Press (Cambridge, MA, 2014), pp. 147-148, fig. 7.1

Exhibition History

32Q: 3440 Middle East, Harvard Art Museums, 11/16/2014 - 01/01/2050

Subjects and Contexts

Google Art Project
Ancient Bronzes

Verification Level

This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of Asian and Mediterranean Art at am_asianmediterranean@harvard.edu

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1943.1318: Axe Head and Shaft Hole with Feline Decoration